THEGAYUK

Day: 18 August 2013

  • Kiwi Same-Sex Couple Become First To Get Married At 30,000 Ft.

    Kiwi Same-Sex Couple Become First To Get Married At 30,000 Ft.

    Air New Zealand becomes first airline to host gay wedding at 30,000 Feet.

    New Zealand gay marriage

    • Couple Lynley Bendall and Ally Wankikau were first New Zealand same-sex couple to wed at 30,000 Feet

    • Actor Jesse Tyler Ferguson and partner Justin Mikita attended the wedding.

    • New Zealand was the 13th Nation to allow same-sex marriages.

    • Monday 19th August was the first day on which same-sex couple could marry in New Zealand.

    An Auckland-based couple has this morning made history celebrating the legalisation of same sex marriage in New Zealand by saying, ‘I do’ in the skies.

    Lynley Bendall and Ally Wanikau, who have been together almost 14 years, wed onboard a special Air New Zealand flight from Queenstown to Auckland.

    The leading ladies made their vows in front of friends and family, including their children Javarn (9), Maycee (7) and Mikaere (6), and Ally’s son Damon.

    The pair exchanged pounamu (New Zealand greenstone) in place of traditional wedding bands before being pronounced as officially wed in front of actor and marriage equality campaigner Jesse Tyler Ferguson, who recently married his long-term partner Justin Mikita.

    “It’s been an absolute pleasure to be able to celebrate this historic and joyous moment with Lynley and Ally. Marriage equality is something very dear to both Justin and me.”

    Following the in-flight ceremony a pop-up choir surprised the couple and their guests, performing the Maori love song Pokarekare Ana which was sung in the New Zealand Parliament following the legalisation of same sex marriage in April.

    Lynley says the couple has waited a long time to make their 13-year union official and she’s ecstatic to be able to call herself a newlywed.

    “To be married at 30,000 feet beneath strings of fairy lights with our children, friends and family as witnesses makes an already memorable day that much more special. It was surreal to have Jesse play a part in the ceremony too – we’re big fans of Modern Family!”

    Jesse and Justin gifted the couples’ children bow ties from their charity Tie The Knot which raises funds for the promotion of marriage equality.

    Air New Zealand Chief People Officer Lorraine Murphy says the onboard ceremony was an unforgettable way to mark the law change. “The atmosphere onboard was incredibly festive and the applause following the couple’s vows was heartfelt. It was a great celebration of New Zealand’s diversity.”

    The couple departs New Zealand tonight on an Air New Zealand service to Los Angeles for their honeymoon at a Palm Springs resort.

  • COLUMN | Cock Eyed

    I was talking to a friend the other day about cocks. It’s a perfect subject for polite conversation on a sunny Sunday over lattes and pastries. My friend and I have similar pedigrees and there was a cock related question I needed to chew over.

    In my thirties I had a period of being quite sociable and my friend remains very sociable too. When I say sociable, I mean the kind of conversations that involve you being naked and muttering just occasional words (e.g. ‘Harder!’ or ‘Yes, yes, yes’). I was newly single after a couple of lengthy relationships, it was all safer stuff and I wasn’t hurting anyone or not that I knew of, anyway. I suspect that there was the odd cuckolded wife or boyfriend tucked away here and there. It was all pretty harmless, very diverting and the only downside was that I had to change the bed sheets a lot and keep up with my depilation.

    After a few years of intermittent promiscuity, I gained a peculiar skill. I began to be able to predict what someone would look like naked. One look at a man fully clothed and I’d get an instant feel for what he’d look like once the layers were stripped away. Musculature, hairiness and penile length and complexion; you name it; I could guess it and was often proved right. It’s not a skill I could teach. I don’t suspect it’s a psychic thing either. Who knows what it stems from? Maybe it’s the nose shape, the hand size or most probably the fact that we often fall into set body types which match up with other features or characteristics. It was just borne of the fact that I was seeing an awful lot of men naked.

    Of course there were always exceptions and nasty or pleasant surprises can lurk in a man’s Calvins. I won’t go into some of the things that I saw but let’s just say that some of them still stick in my throat when I contemplate them.

    Miss Marple, the elderly spinster sleuth, had similar skills but hers tended towards knowledge of the criminal mind gained from studying the locals, rather than her knowledge of men’s undercarriages gained from a lot of time spent on her back. I like to think of myself as a kind of latter day Agatha Christie sleuth but with a whole different skill set.

    Interestingly, my friend has the same ability. He can guess a girth at 50 paces and is invariably not disappointed by what lies beneath the trouser. Maybe the two of us should take ourselves on a tour of Northern Working Men’s clubs with our novelty act. Just think of the furore we could cause on Britain’s Got talent. We’d certainly winkle out a few interesting winkles and definitely make the front pages of the gutter press.

    On second thoughts, I’ll stick to familiar territory. I have a long term partner now and my guess-the-weight-of-the-sausage skills are probably much less than they once were. I can’t go back to all that. My washer wouldn’t take all that bed linen.

  • OPINION | Wrestling With Sexuality

    Professional wrestler Darren Young has come out, instead of a carefully worded and sensitive confessional style interview, he did this during an on the spot chat with TMZ while collecting his luggage.

    When asked if an openly gay wrestler could be successful in the WWE, he replied: “Absolutely, absolutely! Look at me. I’m a WWE Superstar, and to be honest with you I’m gay. And I’m happy, very happy.”

    He remarked that he was unconcerned with how it would be perceived and it shouldn’t change a thing.

    By choosing to come out he has become the first openly gay wrestler in the WWE.

    Darren Young is currently one half of the tag team, the Prime Time Players with Titus O’Neil. The team’s intro track and music refers them as committed and serious athletes in pursuit of wealth and status. On Young’s Twitter account it states his life “revolves around three things — Money, Women and Wrestling.”

    It’s not unusual for a gay man to portray an overtly heterosexual man, look at Neil Patrick Harris in “How I Met Your Mother” or Jeremy Sheffield in “Hollyoaks”.

    How this will play into the WWE storylines remains to be seen.

    The WWE has issued an official statement saying that they are proud of Darren Young for being so open about his sexuality and pledged to support him as a WWE superstar. Fellow wrestler John Cena has also publically backed him. Triple H and Stephanie McMahon have also tweeted messages of support.

    It would not be the first time a wrestler has come out, Chris Kanyon had previously been active within the WWE but was released from his contract due to a string of injuries and relapses. During a promotional activity, he began telling people that he was fired from the WWE for being gay. He later admitted he had only completed the interviews as a publicity stunt. In his autobiography, he later admitted that he was gay. Sadly Kanyon also suffered from bi-polar disorder and later committed suicide, using anti-depressants in 2010.

    Looking over the entire industry and WWE’s brand of sport entertainment, it feels like a bold move. The focus of wrestling is combat based testosterone feuds. How a gay man plays into this as an equal remains to be seen. However with an increasingly viable presence of LGBT characters in films, television and comic books it feels important.

    Looking at it from a professional athletics perspective, role models are necessary to make the move towards equality. Gareth Thomas, Robbie Rogers and John Amaechi all came out after they had retired.

    Darren Young is a true inspiration; he is involved with anti-bullying initiatives and promoting diversity. He is a man at the prime of his career refusing to hide who he is and carrying on doing what he loves in life.

    Opinions expressed in this article may not reflect those of THEGAYUK, its management or editorial teams. If you’d like to comment or write a comment, opinion or blog piece, please click here.